Caused two of my brews to go into the garbage because it left a minerally, salty and soapy taste afterwards. I added it according to the instructions, in a stout and a saison, with similar results. If you are thinking of tweaking you water chemistry, this is not the product to use. If your pH is way off, my recommendation is to look for individual salts to add to your water or mash instead of using a "catch all" like 5.2 stabilizer.

My pH strips and pH meter showed I was close to 7.4? Variouse forms of specility malts and additives were a pain to do. I still have to tweak it a bit but 5.2 Mash ph Stabilizer made it easy and fool proof.

I have spectacularly hard water where I live and water chemistry confuses me. I bought this after seeing it on BTV and gave it a shot. WHOA! my OG readings were way higher than before. I usually have to mask 75 minutes to reach what they should be at 60, with this stuff I'm easily over target OG at 75 mins. It it kinda hard to gauge how well it will work for you.

This will put your mash PH at 5.2 but if you measure treated water at room temp it will be about 5.8 (as stated in another post) I've used this with no taste issues and have relatively high sodium content in my water. Use this and perfect sanitation, proper boil process, and fermentation control. Once you master that get a water test kit and adjust your water properly. Master the other things and you will make award winning beer. Water is the last thing to master unless it is just terrible. In that case buy water at the store.

I brew about once a month, and although I was making good beer, my OGs we're never as high as my beer software indicated it should be. I've tried this stuff for the last year with no other changes, and it has brought my OGs up 7 to 10 percent. I have never experienced any negative effects, and it has never resulted in a salty taste in my beers. But I would imagine its effectiveness would vary depending on one's particular water. I'm using well water in the central Rocky Mountains.

Myself and a number of other science-y types have proven through simple chemistry and trial that this product flat out DOES NOT WORK AS ADVERTISED. It can "accidentally" work for a few people who are already very close to target pH. For the vast majority of brewers not taking a few minutes to read about how simple water chemistry can be, it's an abysmal failure. This absolutely does not "lock in" a 5.2 pH. and if you add enough you'll buffer to ~5.7. Oops. At least it's good for keeping you under 6. Nevermind the sodium.

When switching to filtered tap water (rather than bottled), I realized PH matters. I'm not ready to learn chemistry, and I'm not trying to win awards... I'm just going for good beer. This stuff's my ONE addition, and it's terrific! I love this stuff.

I have made at least 14 5-gallon batches using this stuff. It keeps the pH of the mash at 5.2, but only if your starting water is reasonably close to 5.2. The well water I use is very soft with a pH of around 5.9-6.0. After adding this to my pre-heated water for mash, the pH of that water is still about 5.9. Once it sits in the mash tun with some grain for 5 minutes or so the pH locks to 5.2 and stays there even when the grains are well rinsed and the sparge is over. I usually get around 70-75% mash efficiency using this, the batches I made before using this I would get about 65%. Not a huge difference, but I think it is worth it.It's a buffer solution, with a certain buffer capacity. If you dump it in to water with a pH of 8.0, you are asking too much of that buffer and it's not going to work.

I recently switched to AG and was obsessing about PH. My first beer I screwed up by adding 5.2 according to total water, rather than batch size. Though I got 91% efficiency, the beer was undrinkable, like mineral mud, and was dumped. The second beer, I used half the amount according to batch size (1/2 Tbls per 5 gal). This beer tasted like Perrier with a bit of beer mixed in and was at 88% efficiency. I kept it on the off hope that it will mellow over time, but it is not good now. After the 5.2 debacle, I decided tannins would be better and ignored the PH. This beer was decent, drinkable, but stalled out sweet (it was bigger, 1.085 -> 1.035) and I got 88% again. I just got a water report and my water is probably mineral deficient. I am going to adjust it manually and forget the 5.2 forever.FYI Na 22K 3Ca 29Mg 5Cl 23So4-S 7Total Alk 86

5.2 is a sodium phosphate salt so it adds a whole buncha sodium to your beer - when paired with a high level of sulfates it definitely makes for a less than good beer. You're better off not messing with your water or learning a tertiary amount of information about water. This is not good stuff - I've made award winning beers with it, but I'm the first to say that that was lucky.http://www.homebrewersassociation.org/forum/index.php?topic=1125.0

..but it works!I think ideally you want to get the right mash pH with your water profile and grain bill for the mash, but if you don't want to mess with all that, this is a good alternative. Add it directly to the mash though. Not just to the water.As far as an increase efficiency goes, well I think there are other factors that play into that, but I don't doubt its claim that it helps. Just don't expect it to work miracles if you have efficiency woes.

Would this be useful for extract brewing? I usually brew extract with filtered water I buy form the super market, but if this could improve that process or allow me to just use tap water that would be great! thanks

BEST ANSWER:This product is intended to help control mash pH. Since extract brewing does not involve this step, this product is not really needed. The boiling step of brewing is not particularly sensitive to varying pH. The only concern you should have with using tap water would be if the water contains something that would impart an off-flavor that wouldn't be boiled off. As a general rule, if your water tastes fine to drink straight, it's fine to use for extract brewing.

BEST ANSWER:This product is intended to help control mash pH. Since extract brewing does not involve this step, this product is not really needed. The boiling step of brewing is not particularly sensitive to varying pH. The only concern you should have with using tap water would be if the water contains something that would impart an off-flavor that wouldn't be boiled off. As a general rule, if your water tastes fine to drink straight, it's fine to use for extract brewing.

BEST ANSWER:It is designed to adjust acidity and buffering so it can be used in that way. If you are already customizing your order, you should rely on salts or acids to hit the pH you want. This is the shotgun approach.

BEST ANSWER:It is designed to adjust acidity and buffering so it can be used in that way. If you are already customizing your order, you should rely on salts or acids to hit the pH you want. This is the shotgun approach.